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1 June 2007

Volume 195, Number 11
The Journal of Infectious Diseases 2007;195:1678–1685
© 2007 by the Infectious Diseases Society of America. All rights reserved.
0022-1899/2007/19511-0017$15.00
DOI: 10.1086/517517
MAJOR ARTICLE

Staphylococcal Chromosomal Cassette mec Type I, spa Type, and Expression of Pls Are Determinants of Reduced Cellular Invasiveness of Methicillin‐Resistant Staphylococcus aureus Isolates

Cornelia Werbick,1

Karsten Becker,1

Alexander Mellmann,2

Katri M. Juuti,3

Christof von Eiff,1

Georg Peters,1

Pentti I. Kuusela,4,5

Alexander W. Friedrich,2 and

Bhanu Sinha1,a

1Institute of Medical Microbiology and 2Institute for Hygiene, University Hospital of Münster, Germany; 3Department of Biological and Environmental Sciences, General Microbiology, and 4Department of Bacteriology and Immunology, Haartman Institute, University of Helsinki, and 5Division of Clinical Microbiology, Helsinki University Central Hospital (HUCH) Laboratory Diagnostics, HUCH, Helsinki, Finland

We have shown previously that pls, which codes for the surface protein Pls of methicillin‐resistant Staphylococcus aureus (MRSA), reduces adhesion to immobilized fibronectin, fibrinogen, laminin, and immunoglobulin G as well as invasion of host cells. Here, we tested a collection of 66 clinical MRSA isolates—48 negative for pls/Pls (pls−/Pls−), 15 positive for pls/Pls (pls+/Pls+), and 3 harboring the pls gene but not expressing Pls (pls+/Pls−)—for cellular invasiveness. Invasion of 293 cells by pls+/Pls+ strains was lower than that by the pls−/Pls− strains (median [range], 36% [22%–70%] vs. 93% [25%–162%]). The 3 pls+/Pls− strains (median [range], 95% [63%–103%]) were as invasive as the pls−/Pls− strains. In addition, we identified a pls+/Pls+ staphylococcal chromosomal cassette mec (SCCmec) IV strain. In conclusion, 3 properties—pls/Pls, SCCmec type, and spa type—strongly predicted the cellular invasiveness of MRSA strains, as indicated by good clustering. In contrast, the spa type–deduced multilocus sequence typing clonal complex (MLST‐CC) was not able to predict the invasiveness of MRSA strains equally well. The underlying mechanism remains to be elucidated.

Received 21 August 2006; accepted 29 December 2006; electronically published 23 April 2007.

Reprints or correspondence: Dr. Bhanu Sinha, Institute of Hygiene and Microbiology, University of Würzburg, Josef‐Schneider‐Str. 2, Bldg. E1, 97080 Würzburg, Germany ().

Cited by

Muzaffar Hussain, Daniel Schäfer, Katri M. Juuti, Georg Peters, Bettina Haslinger‐Löffler, Pentti I. Kuusela, and Bhanu Sinha. (2009) Expression of Pls (Plasmin Sensitive) in Staphylococcus aureus Negative for pls Reduces Adherence and Cellular Invasion and Acts by Steric Hindrance. The Journal of Infectious Diseases 200:1, 107-117
Online publication date: 1-Jul-2009.
Abstract-Full Text-PDF Version (637 kB)
G. A. Donker, R. H. Deurenberg, C. Driessen, S. Sebastian, S. Nys, E. E. Stobberingh. (2009) The population structure of Staphylococcus aureus among general practice patients from The Netherlands. Clinical Microbiology and Infection 15:2, 137-143
Online publication date: 1-Mar-2009.
CrossRef

  • Potential conflicts of interest: none reported.

    Presented in part: 10th International Symposium on Staphylococci and Staphylococcal Diseases, Charleston, South Carolina, 23–27 October 2004 (poster PA‐34); 56th Annual Meeting of the German Society for Hygiene and Microbiology, Münster, Germany, 26–29 September 2004 (poster MPP005).

    Financial support: This work was supported by the Deutsche Forschungsgemeinschaft (Collaborative Research Center 492, project B9), in part by grant Si2/039/06 from the Interdisciplinary Center for Clinical Research (IZKF Münster), by a grant from the Academy of Finland (project 1206356), and by a grant from Bundesministerium für Bildung und Forschung, Germany (Pathogenomic Plus Network PTJ‐BIO/0313801B).

  • Present affiliation: Institute of Hygiene and Microbiology, University of Würzburg, Würzburg, Germany.

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